1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to improving classroom instruction for the goal of improving student performance, and more particularly to a system and method for evaluating an educational institution's effectiveness and establishing an index for comparison.
2. Description of the Prior Art
In the field of education, it is a primary objective of educators and administrators of grades K–12 to raise the level of student achievement overall and to narrow the persistent significant achievement gap between high performing students, generally coming from middle and upper socio-economic status families, and lower performing students, generally coming from lower socio-economic status minority families (the “SES performance gap”). Much effort has been spent to analyze the SES performance gap with some researchers/experts attempting to use correlational studies to prove an unbreakable cause-and-effect link between SES and academic achievement. Other researchers, while acknowledging the strong correlation between SES and student performance, have claimed that the correlation can be mitigated through alignment of curriculum and assessment along with effective classroom teaching. Still other researchers have used data to support the assertion that the relationship between effective instruction and student performance is stronger and more predictive than SES.
Ignoring the potential SES link to student achievement or the data concerning the effectiveness of curriculum alignment and quality instruction, educators and administrators have historically relied on information about student achievement as the sole measure of the value of their institutions. In the past, for example, many schools, school districts, and states have used mean student scores from nationally-normed standardized tests to establish ratings/rankings for schools and/or districts such as “high-performing,” “low-performing,” “program improvement,” “blue ribbon,” etc. Because of the persistent SES performance gap, a system of multiple measures was developed. Recently the State of California developed a complex “Academic Performance Index” using, again, student achievement data solely as the basis for rewards and punishment given out in recognition of quality schools and/or districts. Given the data concerning factors that contribute to or possibly cause high or low student performance, the incentives and disincentives given out to schools based upon student performance alone are inappropriate. For example, districts create schools for gifted students by moving the highest performing students from many schools onto one campus. State testing then shows these schools to be the highest performing in the state, and they receive awards based on the students' high test scores. Teachers from low performing schools may even come over to observe the teaching mistakenly thinking that the high test scores are a direct result of exceptional teaching.
Efforts have not been made to quantify in measurable terms a school's educational processes. There are some who believe that the state departments of education should expand their efforts to include such measures. Sanctions and rewards could then be then be given based on the quality of the schools' instructional programs.
For the first time, the Classroom Productivity Index provides an unbiased, non-judgmental method to calculate the effectiveness of a school's educational program. There are, in fact, some educators who believe that schools should receive awards and sanctions based only on their educational effectiveness instead of their students' achievement on state tests.
It is therefore highly desirable to provide a method by which educators and administrators can objectively evaluate the quality of their educational program that will be minimally distorted by the quality of the students it serves and to identify particular areas where changes may be made to improve.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 6,092,081 and 6,405,226 describe an interactive teacher and workstation computer environment where the teacher can mark student work with a tag or goal. The goal may be taken from a standardized list so that the work of all students is evaluated using the same criteria. Different weights may be given to different criteria for use in the analysis, and summary reports can be generated. However, while these patents describe some basic data collection, comparison and reporting, they do not provide any direct analysis of teaching effectiveness as they focus on students' test scores. They use test scores to identify areas in which students need additional teaching. These patents do not attempt to measure nor quantify, especially for the purposes of instructional improvement, key educational processes themselves such as time on task, alignment of teacher assignments to grade-level state content standards, coverage of the breadth and depth of the content standards, and effectiveness of classroom instructional practices.
It is therefore desirable to provide a mathematical model of calculating classroom productivity so that schools can focus their efforts on improving their own instructional effectiveness, which is the foundation of improved student learning that, in turn, produces higher student test scores.